


Letters from a Drifter

by DeanRH



Category: Supernatural
Genre: M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-10-09
Updated: 2020-10-09
Packaged: 2021-03-08 05:01:22
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 2
Words: 1,818
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/26910055
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/DeanRH/pseuds/DeanRH
Summary: Dean composes letters to Castiel.
Relationships: Castiel/Dean Winchester
Comments: 14
Kudos: 17





	1. Chapter 1

_I don't usually write shit down. That's Sammy's thing._

_But I figured, if Dad could do it, I can too._

_Not so much a journal. Let's just call these letters from a drifter._

_I was never the hunter Dad was, but hunting was in my blood. Sam, not so much. Which is weird because we're both blood, but Sam's the research guy._

_We spent most of our lives on the road. Went through a lot. I don't know._

_Cas, you know most of this stuff already._

_But I gotta leave something._

_A legacy._

Dean sat up and rubbed his face, stretching. 

The bunker door clanged open and Sam came down the stairs.

"So get this," he said, and they were off to the races.

Dean hid the letter he was writing.

***

_Everything was gonna end just one way. I knew it, Sam knew it, every hunter knows it._

_Go out guns blazing, isn't that right._

_But then you walked into that barn in a shower of sparks and I stabbed you in the chest._

_And everything, I mean **everything,** changed._

_***_

"Aw, _gross,_ " Dean complained, shaking goo off his hand.

There wasn't much point in it, since he was absolutely drenched in the stuff.

"Dude, you look like that one scene in _Ghostbusters,_ " said Sam, hiding a smile.

"Yeah, yeah," groused Dean. "Laugh it up, why don't ya."

***

_Living on the road, for some people, is an acquired taste._

_It's all I ever knew. No matter how bad I wanted a home, it never really worked out anytime I tried it. Sam once said the same thing to me. But it never made me stop wanting it._

_Then I found home. Not the bunker. But blue eyes and a voice like honey-whisky and gravel._

_Yeah, Cas. I mean you._

_Damn, you're gonna think I'm a sap._

_But I gotta get this out one way or the other, before I'm gone for good, and I ain't man enough to face you alone._

***

Dean watched fondly as Castiel watched television, the edges of his eyes crinkling up as he laughed.

"Man, you're getting good at this, Cas," said Sam, bringing in the popcorn and beer. "I remember when you didn't understand any of the jokes."

"Yes," agreed Castiel. "I understand these references now."

Dean's heart ached in his chest.

***

_I ain't much of a poet._

_Ain't much of a man. Ain't much of anything, really. Saved the world a time or two, so that's gotta count for something, right?_

_So I'm saying I'm sorry, Cas. Sorry for all the fights, and for the times I hurt you, and for the things I've said -_

_you scare the hell out of me, and I know that doesn't sound good, but trust me, it's the best thing that ever happened to me. But when I get scared, I mean **really** scared, I lash out. _

_And time to man up, here's why._

_Castiel, I love you. I'm **in** love with you. Romantic, stupid, die-for-you epic love. _

_It's huge, and it's terrifying, and it's like being devoured like a black hole and enjoying every second. I thought, before - I thought I'd been in love, I thought I'd loved._

_I never loved until you, Cas. It's the biggest thing that's ever happened to me and I didn't know - I don't know how to handle it, even now. Let's call it the size of the Chrysler Building._

_And I've been intimidated and turned on and terrified, drawn to you, all that shit the writers say, all of it, Cas. I memorized every angle of your face, every curve of your cheekbone, every single expression on that stormy-eyed face._

_And I know it ain't really you, not the **real** you, and maybe it's a little freaky that I'm kinda turned on by that too, but we all know I ain't never been vanilla._

_So I wanted to say, here, clear as a heartbeat, strong as a binding spell -_

_I love you, Castiel._

_I love you._

_I love you._

_Because I ain't got the guts for it to go from my heart to my tongue, and I had to tell you somehow._

_I'm a lot braver with my words when I write them down._

***

"Ready?" asked Sam, as Dean climbed behind the wheel of the Impala.

"Hell yeah," said Dean. "You guys ready for pie?"

"I've never had pie!" chirped Jack from the backseat.

"Dean is something of a connoisseur," said Cas.

His eyes met Dean's in the rearview mirror.

They softened into something fond.

Dean melted a little, and put the car into drive.

***

_I hope_

_I hope that you and Sam will understand._

_Take care of Jack, and each other._

_There's probably no need to write this down, but I figure I owe it to Sammy, tell my little brother I love him too, and that there is nothing on this earth, above or below, I have ever loved like I love him. I wish him a good life, the one I've always wanted for him: safe, happy, secure, and to find a love like I did in life, and for him to be braver than I was about it._

_I think that's it, Cas._

_I just_

_I think_

_I wanted..._

_there could have been - there might have been._

_But those days are gone._

_Just know, always, forever, that if I'd only had the guts - if only -_

_but I didn't, and I don't, so as poor a substitute as these letters are, at least I could give you the truth._

_I wish I knew what it was like to kiss you._

_I've been dreaming of it for a decade._

***

"That was really good, Dean!" said Jack. "I really liked the pie."

"Where'd he go?" asked Castiel.

"Dean? I think he's outside looking at the view."

The door of the diner opened, and closed.

"He's not there."

"What do you mean, he's not there?"

The keys to the Impala sat on the diner table.

***

_So I've taken a deal, and traded my existence for the continued existence of Castiel._

_Turns out the Shadow is just as interested in this particular human as all the hounds of hell._

_It was the least I could do, for all you've done - for me, and for Sam, and for the world._

_Goodbye to the love of my life, the angel Castiel._

_Goodbye to the best brother I could have asked for. I love you, Sam. I wish I said it more._

_Goodbye to Jack, beloved son._

_Love_

_Dean Winchester_

***

They turned the bunker upside down.

"Cas?" Sam asked. "Cas, did you find something?"

Sam stared at Castiel.

The angel was clutching several pieces of paper with handwriting on them. 

His hand was over his mouth, tears streaming from his eyes, and his shoulders were wracked with silent sobs.

"Goodbye, Dean," he finally said.


	2. Letter from a Drifter

I thought I would add my own letter to this little story. I'd initially just thought of publishing this by itself, but had a story to get out.

So, I've been a drifter for many years. The pandemic has forced me to stop and think about many things. I thought people might be interested in the perspective of someone who lives the life, minus the monsters.

One of the reasons I'm fascinated by Destiel is that it resembles my experiences on the American road. Drifters are often outcasts, people who don't fit into society all that well. Many of them are gay or bi or trans, many people of different colors and backgrounds and faiths. Neal Cassady from _On The Road_ was bisexual and Alan Ginsburg was gay. These are the kinds of guys you tend to meet when you're a drifter, so the Destiel story made perfect sense to those who live on the road in real life. We've met all kinds of people from all kinds of different walks of life. The multicultural melting pot of the United States is most evident on the road, because that is where you meet a cross section of the most diverse people. Drifters are extremely unlikely to be conservative, simply because, as they say, travel is dangerous to prejudice. You end up working side by side with just about every possible kind of person.

America owes its existence to itinerant workers. We are the people who keep the nation going, the crewmembers behind the scenes. From immigrant farm labor to day labor in factories to moving food and goods across the country, it is drifters, hobos, migrant workers, and others who keep the show onstage, so to speak.

And I've lived this life for nearly my entire life. Drifters are usually looked down upon, and sometimes even pitied. Nomadic lifestyles are not looked favorably upon in many nations, including America, despite the fact that a lot of work would never get done if people like us didn't exist. And most people don't even know about it. The most obvious aspect of this would be truckers, but they don't like to be lumped in with the likes of us, the lower-than-working-class-working-class. We are the French Foreign Legion of America's workers - we do the jobs that nobody else will, or wants, to do.

And then along comes this little television show and changes everything.

I'm not even sure they realize this has happened, or that the newfound respect is related to their show. Suddenly, drifters are cool, something interesting to be. Suddenly, there are all these tours of Route 66 (not a great place to drive btw) and motels and diners. The whole shebang. And I think we have the show, in part, to thank for it. I know that part of the attraction for me was seeing my own real life play out on a fantasy television program. I'd never seen our lifestyle portrayed on TV before and it made me understand the need for representation in media.

But in the end, it was the Destiel story that got me. 

This is the perfect road story, the drifter romance that we never knew we needed. We are often exiles, outcasts from family, outcasts from society -

and the very concept that _anyone_ could view us as worthy, let alone an actual _angel,_ was very exciting indeed. 

So, for us, the grand, epic story of the angel who fell in love with the drifter with the golden soul-

the story of "a fish and a star" -

that is our folklore, from now on, probably for as long as there will be drifters.

I don't care much for the show these days. I was never much of a fan. I watched, fascinated, as the drifter lifestyle was portrayed on TV, but once they moved into the bunker I stopped caring about the show. Now it was just like any other thing I'd ever seen.

But Destiel - that's forever. That's going to outlast and outlive the program itself, at least from a drifter's point of view.


End file.
